Exploiting… the poor

One thing that never fails to amaze your Eyewitness – and he’s a jaded old sod who’s been around the block and some!! – Is the new Opposition’s penchant for bemoaning the level of poverty in Guyana while decked out in finery befitting GQ or a Balenciaga fashion show!! On a more practical level, can Sanction Man actually SEE the poor slobs he seeks out – from behind those ultra-dark glasses?? Or his Sissie and that one-woman party leader swishing circumspectly around the muddy huts in their Prada shoes!
Now don’t get your Eyewitness wrong. Just because someone’s in politics doesn’t mean they gotta dress in sackcloth and ashes!! But still, they should have a sense of proportion so that the messenger can’t be so dissonant from the message. It debunks the premises of that message, no?? And signals that a whole lotta hypocrisy is in play!! We see the same types running NGOs for the poor.
The US taught us about “poverty pimps” who were exposed by Thomas Sowell, the black Harvard Sociologist writing about “whole classes of people living off the poor. The latter are a commodity to these people, who include not only local politicians, community activists and small-time hustlers, but also people with impressive titles and academic credentials, who likewise milk the larger society in the name of the poor.” In Guyana, where the Government money spigot’s only recently been opened up, haven’t these Opposition MPs been collecting their mega salaries – and their duty-free vehicle and other perks? But strike that for Sanction Man – he’d already cheated on the duties of the Rolls and Lambos for him and his Sissie!!
But now that the govt’s money spigot’s been opened, we should learn to recognize local practitioners of poverty pimping. Sowell’s satirical poem, “Poverty Pimps”, describes them well: “Let us celebrate the poor, let us hawk them door to door. There’s a market for their pain, votes and glory and money to gain. Let us celebrate the poor. Their ills, their sins, their faulty diction. Flavour our songs and spice our fiction. Their hopes and struggles and agonies, get us grants and consulting fees. Celebrate thugs and clowns, give their ignorance all renown. Celebrate what holds them down, in our academic gowns. Let us celebrate the poor”!!
Here in ole Mudland, the targeted poor are called “Scrapeheads” – as in having their brains scraped out!! So rather than preparing them to take advantage of the programs – educational, entrepreneurship, loans, housing, etc – to pull themselves out of poverty, these Poverty Pimps gonna keep up a constant litany of accusations of “corruption” or “favouritism!! But then they couldn’t exist if the Government wiped out their constituency!!
They gotta ensure the biblical prophecy – “The poor shall always be with us”! – is fulfilled!!

…the confused
Your Eyewitness sees the Opposition rather confused about their role – in fighting for a constituency they claim is excluded!! He recommends MLK successful strategy in a few simple steps. Step one begins by instructing that the activist becomes thoroughly informed about the injustice, and then educating others about it. Teaching is through ACTION rather than words, and in this way, one transforms oneself. Trouble is the PNC demagogues on social media are so convinced about violent confrontation that to them everything else is “showing weakness”!!
In step two, negotiations are opened up with opponents, using win-win scenarios and committing to non-violent approaches!! And then – only if unsuccessful – in step three, direct action such as sit-ins, marches, petitions etc, are launched. Finally – as Mandela demonstrated magnanimously in South Africa – you gotta attempt to reconcile with your opponents.
After all, if you care about our country, ultimately, we gotta have to live together and build our nation together!!
Restorative rather than retributive justice can heal many wounds!!

…negativity
Some believe “we are what we eat”. Maybe that’s true for the physical body! But for success in the world, your Eyewitness believes “we are what we think”.
So, could Opposition leaders please dump their continuous negativity?